The present invention relates to printer cartridges, installation detection methods of printer cartridges in a printer apparatus, and printer apparatuses.
Conventionally, printer apparatuses selectively heat an ink ribbon housed in a cartridge at a printing unit having a print head and the like to print images or characters to recording media. Generally, the ink ribbon used in the printer apparatus includes sequential bands of colors, such as Y (yellow), M (magenta), C (cyan) and Bk (black) in the ribbon retrieving direction. Thus, color printing is performed when printing at the printing unit by selecting the proper colors from the ink ribbon.
Therefore, it is necessary to control positions of the colors on the ink ribbon with such printing apparatuses. When the cartridge that houses the ink ribbon is installed in the apparatus, a predetermined color on the ink ribbon is arranged at a predetermined printing position. For that reason, it is necessary to detect whether the cartridge has been pulled out from the apparatus. Furthermore, each time the cartridge is detected, a predetermined color on the ink ribbon must be positioned at the printing position.
As disclosed in Japanese Unexamined Patent Application Publication Number H05-139013, Japanese Patent Number 3330476 and Japanese Unexamined Patent Application Publication Number 2006-62278, various mechanisms have been proposed to detect the detachment or installation of a cartridge in the printer apparatus.
However, with each of the mechanisms proposed in the publications listed above, the system returns to a state prior to the installation of a cartridge even in a reinstalled state. In that state, it is not possible to detect whether the cartridge has been pulled out (uninstalled). For this reason, conventionally, the installation of the cartridge was determined and the ink ribbon had to be positioned every time the system was recovered after the power was turned on or after a problem had occurred in relation to the power supply. Therefore, by repeating the positioning of the ink ribbon, ink ribbons had to be replaced frequently which caused the problem that the user has to bear unnecessary running costs.
In view of the problems associated with the prior art, an object of the present invention is to provide a printer apparatus that suppresses unnecessary positioning of the ink ribbon to enable effective use of the ink ribbon, an installation detection method for a cartridge installed in the apparatus, and a cartridge that can be installed and removed from the apparatus.
Further objects and advantages of the invention will be apparent from the following description of the invention.